Linas.P

That would be good idea, except in UK you are not allowed to defend yourself. Thief can do whatever they like, sentences are joke, police are not even interested to investigate, they actually won't investigate car theft, theft from cars of any damage related even remotely to the car which is insured. Basically, police have now politely stopped policing that entire type of crime - if it is insured then police will no longer investigate, even if it is not insured but could be insured, they won't investigate either. So really the only option left is to include theft of cats and associated costs as part of car ownership nowadays, because you (we) are legally not allowed to do anything about it and police won't help. Surely, they would punish you in case you break said miscreant neck, or if you are yourself and shoot one of the animals - you see that is not car related theft and as such it is not allowed. But anything car related... basically you can just help yourself. As for cat guard - I am not sure it is worth it, I heard of several stories where such scum deliberately destroys the car if they cannot extract the cat... sure if you drive the car for £2000 and catalytic converted with fitment is quarter of it's value, then it is different story. But if you car is £20,000 then fitting protector will save your £500 cat, but may cost you £20,000 once every single window and light on your car is smashed and every panel is dented and scratched with said "wooded sticks" - the message is "don't you dare to protect yourself". If it sounds like I am just barking here without any valuable advise... that is true - I don't think there is actually any option, this is the conditions in the country in which we living.

Exactly - that is how insurance normally works around the world, but not in UK and not in Ireland. Here insurers are above the law and above the government when it comes to deciding who can and who can't drive and they don't need to explain anything at all. Real story - when I came to UK in 2008 and quoted for insurance just for fun to see how much it would costs I got quote of £36000.... and it wasn't even Bugatti... I think it was something like BMW 320 or 325... something rather "average", I think I quoted that car because it was parked outside of our house with sale sticker for £850 or maybe £1850. What was the funniest thing is that I got call from insurance company and the guy said "so do you want to go ahead with the quote" 😁 and I was like "seriously, £36000?!" and started kind of negotiating to see what it would cost realistically thinking that maybe he going to say "no this is just mistake, it is actually £3600" even thought I would not pay even £360 on that old crappy BMW... but the guy was like dead serious and said "well if you don't want don't insure" and hang-up. And that is basically the point - they don't need you, you are the one who needs them... simply because you have no options, either you pay whatever or you don't drive -the are the kings here, they tell you what you have to pay and you will pay. And they can afford that because in UK fines for driving without insurance are very high and police are going to great lengths to enforce them (yet they won't even investigate hit and run). In other countries no insurance is like £50-£100 fine... end of story. As such insurance itself is maybe £250-500 i.e. the fine in the country is proportionate to the price of insurance (or vice versa) - if the person has an option to get insurance for £500, then they won't risk £100 fine. But in UK when fine is £3000 + 6 points + confiscation of the car, then suddenly it is OK to quote people anything, if they would try to do that in any other EU country people would simply drive without insurance and pay fines - would certainly work out cheaper than insuring in UK.

That is slightly besides the point - what I am saying is that insurance companies consider windscreen damage as accident, same like somebody would rear-end you at the traffic lights. It is non-fault and wont impact NCB, but it will increase the premium next year same as any other accident. If you don't want to claim I would advise not to disclose the damage to insurance company, I made such mistake in the past - some **** change the lane, scratched my bumper and run away. It was not worthy to claim it from insurance as my excess was £1000 and the scratch was £250 to fix. However, because it was hit and run I reported it to police, police asked insurance reference number, so like "good citizen" I made moronic mistake and declared it to insurance as "notification only" - guess what it came back to bite me in the ***** next year when my insurance premium went-up. Regarding SAC, you most definitely should not declare that to insurance, they have no legal right to ask you to. In fact they have no legal right to ask you anything as insurance policy is not a matter of civil law, but a matter of contract law - any disclosures you make are made based on your "good will". The only difference is whenever what you say could be checked or can't be checked. Same like you can put your occupation as Priest if you wanted to - they have no legal right to ask you, but they still do. When you actually get points sadly you have to disclose it - not because they have a legal right to ask, but because DVLA will gladly provide such information for corporations making money out of you. What I am saying - if you don't disclose SAC or your occupation, there is nothing insurance company can do about it and they have no other way to find out. However, if you don't disclose the points then they can check that in DVLA (and as unbelievable as it is DVLA will tell them) and will invalidate your policy.

Yes + not only it is too expensive, but there are no transparency whatsoever how they come-up with price, leaving a lot of space for market manipulation which insurance companies definitely do. For example it is generally illegal to create cartels and rig the price, but insurance companies 100% does exactly that. They admit and even advertise that they have private databases which they share with other insurance companies - in any other industry this would be illegal, but for insurance in UK that is "absolutely fine". Other thing which I hate is that they avoid all the income taxes in UK and claim they make no profit despite charging one of the highest premiums in Europe. Just for example in most countries in Europe the only 2 things you provide to insurance companies is you driving license number and car registration number. That is it - not other questions and they not even allowed to ask anything else. From VRN they know ~value of the car and how powerful it is and from diving licences they get age and experience... and that is all they need - you can drive unlimited miles, you can keep car anywhere you like, you can have as many as you like kids and work anywhere you want as none of that is related to driving or insurance company business. And importantly if you have speeding fine, you pay it to government and the government decides when you can drive or when you can't. If you can't drive then you won't have driving licences. In UK you may have a license and the car, but you may get insurance quote of £9000 and that means private company will decide you civil liberties here. Disgusting!

Exactly that - it is government supported and legally enforced fraud. Insurance companies can do anything they like, they have 0 oversight, 0 transparency, they pay 0 taxes and they are the only ones who decide whenever you will drive on the roads or not. In short in UK it is not the government on DVLA which generally decides who are allowed to drive, but the privately owned for profit business who does. And government legally compels and heavily penalises everyone to accept whatever unfair price insurance companies vomits out. What is worse is that whenever you actually come to claim, they will always use all possible tricks to pay as little as possible... and even after paying you absolute minimum they can get away with they will still increase your premium as such that everything you got you going to pay them back in next 5 years, even if it was not your fault.

That sounds correct. I would say £1000 for Honda Civic was rather high, but obviously it depends on what Civic it is. For reference my first insurance on IS250 @24 years old was £2800. First insurance on RC200t when I was 30 was £1400... Overall, £500 increase in insurance from Civic to GS sounds about right. Insurance in UK is fraud, so nothing surprises me.

It absolutely does. If you go via insurance it will count as "accident", so depending on how much you pay for insurance expect 10-30% hike next year. It does not impact NCB, but it is still an "accident". For example I never had accident where I was at fault, but when I got new car insurance decided to check accident history which they never did before and raised my insurance by £400. When I started arguing about it they said "no matter whose fault it was or if it impacted NCB, you have to declare all accidents you had", and when we discussed the accidents windscreen replacement was one as well. Insurance is legalised fraud - don't expect much, they will take last penny out of you if they can.

Yes, that would be normal and not an issue of the gearbox. The thing is - gearbox warms-up much slower than engine, so driving 5km certainly not even enough to warm it up from -25C. I doubt even engine fully warms-up in such a short distance. Especially, on automatic gearboxes which works out based on solenoids and are sensitive to viscosity of the fluid, if fluid is thicker at -25C then obviously it will not work as designed until it reaches standard operating temperature.

Well, yes I guess winter is not equal winter and if it was -30C all night then I don't have much experience with that and cannot advise. Certainly when the car us "up-to temp" there should be no lumpy gear changes between 5th and 6th.

What is the mileage? Has fluid been changed or at least refreshed? That it becomes smoother when it warms-up I guess it is just physics and as well it takes longer for gearbox to warm-up then it takes for an engine. The second issue - lumpy when shifting from 5th to 6th is not normal, lower gears (1,2 and 3) under acceleration could punch you a bit especially when gearbox "undecided on which gear to choose", but changes between 4th, 5th and 6th should not be noticeable at all. What I mean "undecided" is that say you cruising along and then decide overtaking, at first just half a pedal, but as you start overtaking for whatever reason you decide to press it to the floor - at first gearbox thinks "it will be enough to downshift from 4th to 3rd", but then when changing to third it realises you asking for 2nd and almost changes another gear without 3rd being fully engaged. In short anytime that you change "parameters" like accelerator input or load in between gears changing there could be a jerk as gearbox has to change what it is doing midway, but this in my experience only ever happens on 1st, 2nd and 3rd.

Haaa... It feels almost like I have said it myself - hate both 300h and 200t... RC350 would be so much better than both, but as it happens Lexus decided we do not deserve to have it in UK! And RC-F is great, but it is a leap too far for me - "performance car "tax etc.

I had 3 of them as well and it still feels like and upgrade when moving back from 2017 RC

yeah - I guess if I am right on where Vlad is leading... IS250 gearbox is generally smooth, so maybe you need to look into why it get's jerky in the first place. Although, what one considers jerky, the other could consider smooth. As well, I appreciate that if slow down very shortly and then accelerate exactly at the time when gearbox is changing from 2nd to 1st, then it could be jerky i.e. you asking gearbox to change 2nd to 1st and back to 2nd again in very quick succession and it may not be as smooth as normal, just kind of inevitable I guess.

Definitely, as well I can confirm IS mk3 and RC has same thing: why would they change it just for 2011-13?

Agree, + they still use double sided tape anyway to seal the holes off. But you need to ask this question Lexus engineers, not me.

and the later non-f-sport (predictably) looks like this:

nope... because those looks like this:

I can just say - good luck! Paint on callipers are already experiencing harsh conditions and even heat resistant paint tends to fail. Not sure what is the purpose to perfectly match the colour knowing that normal paint will simply discolorate from heat.

Are you sure you can get either of colour in heat resistant paint? That would be far more relevant question for me than perfect colour match with colour which can only be compared on internet forum.

Whereas I don't see the difference, the colour is not the same - car is metallic almost perl, callipers are simple gloss.

I am sure that there are some standard two sided tape holding them (like any badges) on top of there being holes for placement.

The orange on Lexus callipers aren't even very fancy, looks like simple gloss colour. Further you will have limitations on what is available from heat resistant paint types. Nowadays there are more choice than basic 5 colours, but still trying to match exact colour may not be technically possible without compromising with paint type.

I am just wondering whenever precise colours matter for something like callipers. After less than 200 miles nobody will be able to tell if it is precisely OEM colour or any other shade orange. I think any bright orange colour would do.

the picture tells many words 🙂

Not listed on mainstream sites maybe? Although now it certainly is on AT. Other guess - buying such car without test drive would be strange and those were recently not available. Second thing with all F cars - they are niche, so yes there are very few of them, but very few buyers as well, so it could be matter of being in right place at the right time.